Electric car conversion: Project ForkenSwift

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by SVOboy

My engine with tranny with fluids would weigh about 180 I'd say. I can pick it up by myself but of course I hurt myself in the process. I did it the other day,

yikes. i've heard the metro tranny only weighs 60 lbs. the 3-pot weighs 134.5 lbs. (just checked teamswift). so the 1.3 can't weigh more than 179.3 lbs (30% larger than the 1.0).

probably a safer bet is 160 lbs.

dang. that forklift traction motor is the same length as the ICE, but i'm afraid it's going to be as heavy as the 400 lb motor this guy used in his 60's chevelle forklift conversion:



http://poormansev.com

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by someone

Someone pointed out that a really big motor is probably pretty good at handling heat loads...

does size of a brushed motor relate directly to efficiency?

i understand that motor heat is a symptom of inefficiency, and a large motor like this is much less succeptible to overheating.

but is its low heating a result of some inherently more efficient design, or because it's just a better heat sink?

[MetroMPG]

in the forklift, none of the motors are exposed to moving air - they're all tucked up high underneath the chassis (of a slow-moving vehicle). and the fact that it was built for a low-voltage, high amp, poor cooling environment should mean its windings are extra beefy and it should be dead reliable.

it looks like all 4 motors have vents and internal shaft fans on them. (which is typical). the power steering motor's intake vent was *completely* full of dustbunnies, and the other motors were partially blocked. mildly greasy (hydraulic fluid?) dust bunnies.

still, replacing a 160lb engine with a 400 lb motor (guessing) is going to present new "challenges"...

[MetroMPG]

another couple of hours tinkering underneath a 16,600 lb forklift which didn't squash me like a bug = another successful late afternoon!

got the second hydraulic motor out and both hydraulic pumps:



above is a hydraulic motor: 8 inch diameter, approx 13 inch length, 110 lbs weight. the pump is on the right side of the motor.



this is the main traction motor, looking from the rear towards the front. that's the left front wheel in the pic. the beige bit furthest forward in line with the motor is the differential.

motor is approx 12 inch diameter, 15 inches long, not including the seat/safety brake assembly (closest end in the pic). it's like an inverse brake drum with the shoes around the outside. the drum is connected to the tailshaft of the motor, and the brakes are engaged/disengaged by a mechanical link to the driver's seat. when you're off the seat, it springs up and the motor is locked. it's effectively a parking brake since the motor is directly connected to the diff.

i took the thick electrical cables off the motor. the cable casing is printed with: "diesel and locomotive cable". how cool will that look under the hood of a suzuki swift.

so tomorrow's the big day. traction motor comes out, and then all's left is to fish the cables and control wires out of the chassis and remove the control panel (controller & contactors). SVOboy, i'd call you over to help move the motor, but i'm afraid you'd hurt yourself again

if i'm lucky, the scrapyard gets the leftovers on friday. if not, then first thing next week. i'm sure the neighbours will be happy to see the thing gone.

[MetroMPG]

trying to estimate the traction motor's weight: a quick comparison of the volume of each motor based on their outer dimensions, and the larger one is just under 2 times the volume.

assuming the innards are scaled proportionately, is it reasonable to guess the bigger motor is about 2x heavier?

i'm seriously hoping it's not 400 lbs. 220 would be nice.

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by RH77

"MetroMPG said... "diesel and locomotive cable". how cool will that look under the hood of a suzuki swift."

I just had a recurring idea. I grew up around locomotives with my father being an engineer. Long story short, I got to know how they worked from the time I was like 3 years old.

For those who don't know, it's an interesting process, which has worked well for over 50 years. The "Prime Mover" is the big Diesel engine that you hear rumbling. This engine ranges in number of cylinders 12-16, and the pistons are larger than you or I. Redline is around 500 RPM.

The Diesel engine turns a huge generator, which produces a schload of electricity. The electric power from the generator goes to the "Traction Motors", which is what moves the locomotive (some have 4, some 6). When slowing or going down a large hill, instead of burning up the brakes or losing air, many loco models have what's called "Dynamic Braking". The traction motor's polarity is reversed, and turned into generators. The resistance slows the train and sends the electricity to huge capacitors where the juice is lost in heat dissipation.

I've thought many times how this would work to power a car. Could a small engine and generator, in team with some batteries, use the same concept to make a car that's FE? The purpose of the batteries could be used to get the vehicle going, then the engine kicks in to get the power flowing to recharge the batteries and power the traction motor on the vehicle. In addition, regenerative/dynamic braking could charge the batteries. The question would be whether the generator and small engine would weigh more than the additional batteries on an electric-only setup. The range would definitely increase, as would the speed (depending on your electric motor). A plug-in system could re-charge the batts overnight. Almost like a hybrid, but perhaps more efficient.

Sorry to beat on GM again, but half locomotives out there are made by a division of GM, and the other half by GE. GM has the technology -- modify it into cars!

RH77

...

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by someone

Someone challenged RH77's suggestion that a series ICE/electric would be a good setting in a car

So RH77 replied...

I considered that. I asked this question about 20 years ago, of course with the answer that we have plenty of oil, why change the current powertrain design.

I agree with you on a few points, but also have some rebuttal. It's true that a loco doesn't have a series of gears: some are geared for high-speed, some are for raw power, low-speed, and in-between, etc. But with the absence of a transmission in a vehicle, that's additional weight savings. A parallel engine/motor idea is pretty efficient, but my goal is weight reduction. With Metro's setup, many heavy batteries may be required to store a decent charge to get around. I'm not saying to stick a 0.7L Diesel hooked to a separate generator, but an all-in-one design like a larger household generator -- those little things can power a house. It's only a theory, and I'm sure the current draw would bog it down, but it's an idea. The forklift motor itself looks pretty darn heavy by itself.

RH77

[MetroMPG]

What about an air powered hybrid?

Originally Posted by RH77

Hey, I made one of those in high school! Yes, I am and was a science nerd. For a competition we ran a small dune-buggy sized vehicle on compressed air. The "transmission" was an impact wrench hooked to a few compressed air tanks and welded to a low-resistance bicycle wheel. After it got going, it really started to take off, until we ran out of air :-( It had to be hydraulic as well, so we pumped our way around with pressurized transmission fluid. We're lucky that nothing blew up. Anyways, off-topic stuff.

Metro- any updates? Kind of excited to see this come together. The motor sounds like a ball-buster, though. Could you raise it up from under the car to it's mounts, using a jack or platform/jack?

RH77

[MetroMPG]

rh77 - good train post. the house is not far from a shunting yard, and i used to cross the tracks (illegally - but never got busted.. or busted up) when i worked at a nortel factory on the other side of the tracks.

the yard engines are icons of corporate wastefulness: they NEVER turn them off, from november through march. they idle continuously all winter. i suppose they're hard to start when cold, but thats' ridiculous.

as for why GM doesn't apply their train know-how to road vehicles? they actually are:

Ten GM Diesel Hybrid Buses to Oahu
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2004..._diesel_h.html

gm's hybrid strategy is interesting to say the least: focusing on the most "wasteful" vehicles first. there is some logic in it (more fuel is saved by improving a bus' mpg from 4 to 5 mpg, than a subcompacts' mpg from 40 to 50.) but it's not helping their green image.

[MetroMPG]

RH77 says...

You know, I do recall seeing that on "MotorWeek" TV. They're also working on vehicles like FedEx delivery trucks. On the GM-Allison test track they had the vehicle stopped, got up to about 10 mph on the electric motor, then the Diesel engine would start, ramp-up, and take-over automatically. We all know that from a standing stop, a huge amount of particulates are belched out of a Diesel truck. That was the focus. The question still remains (maybe I should research this first) but is a CNG bus less pollutive (another word that I probably made up -- I'm sticking with it). At any rate, I'm probably hard on GM because I was forced to buy one as my first car and after 4 senseless failures, I went down the Honda road and never looked back. In Northeastern Ohio, you get bad-mouthed for buying a "foreign" car, with all of the GM and Ford assembly plants around there. And of course we all knew someone who worked for them, so you had to buy one. I was fed up during college when my second Beretta started mixing the oil and coolant due to a blown head gasket. In a heated rage I dumped the Chevy and bought a Barebones Civic DX. The whole family gasped in horror! "Yeah, but it's made in Marysville, Ohio". That was the saving grace. Then when I bought my Evo, my Dad was like, "you know Mitsubishi made planes for the Japanese during World War II" -- mostly razzing me. Some generations just don't give up on International grudges. But for me, GM has rubbed me the wrong way in my generation four times, so I'm bitter. The 4 Honda/Acuras that we've had -- best investment. They've earned my trust.

Anyways, on my Dad's railroad, they shut down the locos at night -- in the Winter they plugged them into a 220V outlet to maintain heat for a slick start. I'm guessing the yard near your house has small "switch" engines, which are hard to start unless plugged-in. Another thing to consider is that they may operate them 24/7 by continuously putting trains together for the open "road", and idle between shifts or during lunchtime. The railroad is a strange employer. Time of day doesn't matter much when you work, and your shift could really vary. If they didn't have a 3rd shift and let them idle all night, that's just, well, not a good idea.

Thanks for the thumbs-up on the post...it's been a while ;-) Honestly I had it coming on some of those as I look back on them.